The Protector

Chapter 3

I woke up and stretched in my bed before throwing my thin blanket off and moving to the bathroom. I took my time and showered with the hottest water available, which was practically freezing, before running downstairs to get some food and watch some tv. Rather than workout as I usually did in the mornings, I wanted to relax for a while so my body wouldn’t have to work so hard to finish healing up the bruises on my ribs I had received two days ago. I had the house to myself for the moment since my father wouldn’t be around until later that night, though I had no idea where he had disappeared to. Not that I was really complaining about his new routine of prolonged absence.

I sat on the couch and began eating my bowl of cereal, quickly finishing it and watching a cartoon on television for a moment longer. I absentmindedly ran my hand through my hair, feeling the scar I had received a little over a year ago from when my father practically busted my skull open. The thought in itself caused me to smirk, as though the idea of his failed attempt to take my life brought me joy. I stood up, deciding that my food had settled enough that I could go for a small run to test out how my ribs were feeling.

After turning the tv off and washing my bowl, I moved outside to the sweet spring air. The recent blooming of flowers caused a rush of pollen to seemingly hit me in my nose, causing me to sneeze twice. 

I took my clothes off and threw them to the side of the house before jumping into my wolf form and beginning my run. I loved being in my wolf form because, unlike in human form, your thoughts were a lot less complicated. Instead of speaking with words, your thoughts came in pictures which made communication in this shape very simple. There were no underlying tones, no hidden meanings, nothing complicated.

The cold air nipped at my west nose, but that was as far as the weather got because I still had parts of my thick fur coat.

I let my feelings course through me as I began running, the pain in my chest slowly catching up with me. Nonetheless, I forced my legs to go faster, welcoming the wind hitting my fur and causing my eyes to water. I ran practically everyday after school to pass the time until I had to go home and make dinner, so my body was used to prolonged periods of cardio by now. I could go for hours before I realized that I had passed Washington’s state border.

Once I reached a familiar spot in the woods, I proceeded to lay down against a fall log with my eyes fixed on the small creak running in front of me that led to a beautiful lake. I usually stopped to rest when something was on my mind, something that wasn’t emotionally based. Lately I’ve been troubled with something a little more complicated than the average essay question or book analysis. In two years I would be graduating high school and since my grades were in pretty good standing, especially my literature grades, I had a pretty good shot at getting into college. The only problem with that, was actually going to college. 

I would have to apply for an enormous amount of scholarships to receive even the first year of college, seeing as though I didn’t have any trust fund or invested parents. 

I chuckled at the thought.

Getting into a college and paying for it by myself would be challenging, but not as challenging as leaving my pack. Though I went to a normal high school, I cared very little about making friends with any of the pure humans there. It just wasn’t something that was a priority in my life and honestly, it wasn’t in the interest of anyone else in the pack either. Therefore, I didn’t really know how to live a regular, human life. None of my animal instincts would help me in the human world and what was even worse, I might lose my animal side. 

I had heard that when you repress your animal for so long, it becomes harder to draw it back up. You could even lose your entire animal side. Though lately, I had been thinking if that was necessarily such a bad idea or not. 

By the time I was tired of thinking the pros and cons of every scenario involved in me going to college, my brain felt toasted and the sun was low in the sky. I took a deep breath rolled against the log behind me, taking in the view of the darkening woods around me. The scent of my pack was scarce here, but it was our territory nonetheless. I stood up and was just about to take off when I heard a sharp cracking sound nearby.

My theories and explanations for the sound were cut off sharply when a twig snapped a few meters away from me. I kept still but continued to listen with my keen hearing as another twig snapped. Directing my gaze towards the sound, I found a wolf standing a few meters away from me, staring at me from under a bush. I tried to think of who looked like that in the pack but when it’s musty scent carried over to me I realized that it wasn’t from our pack.

It was a rogue.

I quickly mind-linked our pack’s Beta, the image of the rogue before me playing out in my head. He responded, more or less saying that he was sending two wolves. Before I could ask anything else, the rogue darted off, causing me to chase it on instinct. 

The tiny wolf was fast, but it was slowed down by twigs and limbs from the trees which I could easily break through. I growled at the wolf to give another warning, knowing that it understood the primal meaning. In my wolf form I was filled with the feeling- or rather the need to protect my pack.

The scenery quickly changed as the woods turned into a river crossing with rapid currents that I knew to be extremely dangerous in parts. The small wolf didn’t hesitate to jump into the water and attempt to swim across, it’s tiny form immediately struggling against the fast paced water.

I jumped into the water after it, my body starting to involuntarily shiver from the shock of the freezing water that immediately soaked my coat and made it harder for me to swim across. I finally caught up to the small wolf but found myself facing its canines in a matter of seconds. We fought back and forth, our jaws and claws causing water to clash around us. I watched as the smaller wolf’s head would dip below the surface of the water a few times before it would surge back at me with a newfound adrenaline. 

Finally after several minutes of drifting farther down the dangerous river, I caught it by the neck and started the dangerous swim back to the shore, squeezing the wolf’s oxygen supply just enough for it to submit. 

Dragging the shaking creature away from the water, I told my Beta that I had caught the rogue. I could feel his sense of pride in me before our connection dropped a few moments before a brown and a sandy wolf ran through the trees towards me, causing me to release my grip and allow the foul smelling rogue to drop at my wet paws.

Hunter, the sandy colored wolf, poked his nose towards the rogue in a silent question to ask if it was dead. In response the rogue growled lightly even as it shook in fear, causing Hunter to growl at the rogue in a silent demand to get up and go with them. As I started to follow them, Clinton the brown wolf turned and snapped lightly at me to tell me to stay back. I growled back, my hunches immediately rising and my body heating as if preparing to let off more steam. After all, who was he to tell me that I couldn’t take in the rogue that I had captured. Clinton bared his teeth once more and reminded me through our link that it was a direct order, causing me to back down despite my anger. I was already a pretty sore thumb for the pack and I didn’t want to do anything more to worsen my situation.

Hunter looked between Clinton and me, as if thinking to himself, before nudging the wolf again to get up and move. I watched as they led my catch back to our Gamma, my paws rooted to the ground. I growled as soon as they disappeared from my sight and began to pace back and forth while my claws tore the soft ground under me and filled my nostrils with the smell of fresh dirt.

I felt anger rush through me as I thought again about the whole situation played out. Fighting and catching that rogue was the only thing that I had done right by my pack in so long. And now, no one was even going to know about it. I let the anger fill me as I began the run back home, my wet fur drying in no time with the harsh wind that started to pick up. My anger usually led to rash decisions, which usually led to me getting a new scar or two so I forced my furry into my paws as they practically beat the ground, turning up dirt as I dashed through the trees. I let my emotions seep out of me, as if they were a cloud that could evaporate into the cold air around me.

By the time I got home, I was still angry. 

And so was he.

Once I had arrived home with a temper, it wasn’t long before my father laid his hands on me, causing me to stumble and hit my head on something hard. As I stumbled over my own feet from the dizziness, he grabbed the back of my shirt and led me down to our dark pit that was our basement. I could smell a fire as we walked down into the basement, the scent of burning wood filling my nose and warming my insides. The next few seconds were a blur as he dragged me over to a wall where I then felt something grasp my wrists and ankles. As soon as I began to regain my vision, I felt something hard connect with my head and I was forced back into the dark abyss.

When I opened my eyes again I was disoriented and experiencing a dull pain on the right side of my head. I tried to walk forward, but something was restraining me at my wrists and ankles. Finding my arms and legs restrained by chains attached to the wall, I began to feel my breaths stagger. I looked around the dark room, slowly regaining my memory of what had happened before I had passed out. I had arrived home, my father had hit me and then he had dragged me down here. To the basement. I had been to the basement once since we moved into the house and I was sure none of this had been here back then. Along the wall to my left was an assortment of what looked like tools, all hung up as if for decoration. At the end of the wall to me left was a large wood burning stove that filled the room with the smell of burnt wood. Somewhere towards the middle of the room was a small table with wheels that looked like something you’d see in a hospital; it was covered with what looked to be dentist tools. I had to admit, I was starting to freak out.

The room itself smelled mainly of the fire from the stove, but there were a few underlying smells as well. You could smell the damp corners and musty mildew on the walls of the basement as well as an iron like smell from the tools that adorned the left wall. 

There was a single lightbulb in the middle of the room, though it didn’t really do any good when it came to lighting the dark doorway in the basement that seemed to lead to another room.

“You’re awake,” a voice practically whispered from the shadows to my right. 

“What’s going on?” I asked, my voice steady yet hoarse. My father faintly came into view, the darkness seeming to be attached to his every movement. “Why am I in chains?” I questioned. He moved over to the center of the room and began to wheel over the small table, bringing to light all of the small instruments placed on top of it. There were at least eight different tools which resembled those used in surgery and dissections.

“No! Stop!” I growled loudly, my heartbeat instantly increasing at the idea of what might be coming. I pulled at the chains at my wrists, wondering if I could break the metal or even pull the chains themselves out of the wall. What was going on here? He wasn’t really planning on using those tools on me, was he?

“You need to be taught,” he claimed in a monotone voice that didn’t fit him. I struggled to pull my hands from the restraints around them but it only burnt the skin around my wrists the more I pulled. The metal was too strong for me to break so I resorted to trying to yank the chains from the wall despite the pain it caused me. 

I tried to look at his eyes as he fiddled with the instruments on the table, his face appearing void of emotion. His eyes were always what scared me the most. You could tell how intense a wolf’s emotions were with one look into the wolf’s eyes. If a wolf was angry, you could see that their eyes were darker than normal. My father’s eyes had once been a light brown but now they were like black pits that seemed to swallow me whole each time he looked at me. I now wondered if it was his wolf trying to get out, or something much, much worse. 

“You’re incompetent,” he whispered, pulling me out of my daze. I jerked against the clasps that held my wrists, causing the chains to echo throughout the basement again. “Your attempts to escape are futile,” he chuckled, his black eyes turning to look at me, sending a shiver throughout my body and making me feel helpless. There was something inside of him, something that moved just behind his eyes and hungered for the taste of blood. It was moving and I could see it.

“Pull all you want, you’re never going to get out of them,” he said, “they’re silver.” I felt my breathing falter for a moment as I realized that he was right. I could already feel my energy drain the more I struggled. I needed to find another way out.

He turned around and made his way to the stove as I focused on wondering how long it would take for someone to recognize my absence. Would it be days? Weeks? Months? The only person that remotely cared was Tommy and he knew that going a week without seeing me wasn’t unusual. I would have to focus on freeing myself by myself if I was to get out of here.

My attention focused on my father as the sound of metal on metal rang throughout the basement. My heart picked up speed as I realized exactly what that stove’s purpose was.

“You’re to blame,” my father whispered as he turned around. When I finally saw what was in his hand, my body gave an involuntary jerk as my heart threatened to break the ribs protecting it. In his now gloved hands was weirdly shaped iron poker, the end burning a bright red. No-it wasn’t iron but silver. It would leave a scar that could potentially kill me. 

“Get away from me,” I whispered, my voice barely coming out as my eyes glued onto the object in his hands. He was going to kill me. 

“You let her die,” he whispered, taking a step towards me. My eyes shot from the poker to his own possessed, blackened eyes. “You took her away from me.” I had always known that he blamed me for the death of my mother, but I had known that there was never anything I could have done. 

“I was seven!” I roared at him, my panic turning into anger as I jerked at the chains holding me

“You should have been stronger!” He roared back, walking to stand in front of me. I was careful not to show any fear on my face, knowing he would treat me worse if I did. “You should have protected her!” He growled in my face. “You should have protected her or you should have died trying to.” I looked away, fearing he’d see the guilt in my eyes for running away from it all.

“You see,” my father said in an unnervingly calm voice. “You let her die and you know it.” I looked back at him and found him with teary eyes. I had never seen my father cry before and it made me feel almost guilty, knowing that it meant he must have really loved my mother. Too bad he didn’t feel that way about me.

But I knew what happened that day. I knew that I was a coward but at the end of the day I was seven and I couldn’t save her. It wasn’t my fault that she had died. 

He took a deep breath and looked over at the poker in his hand, his next words coming out barely above a whisper. “You practically killed her yourself,” he muttered, his pure black eyes widening and moving to focus back on me. Before I could say anything back, he leaned forward until his mouth was next to my ear, his warm breath fanning across my neck and making me feel more trapped now than ever. “And I’m going to make sure that you remember it forever.” 

Before I could even take in a breath, he grabbed my shirt and ripped it off of me, leaving both my chest and the shirt in shreds. I hissed at the sharp pain his nails caused, but I could handle the pain they caused me. But the next pain was almost unbearable.

I resisted the urge to scream and instead growled through my gritted teeth as a spreading pain appeared on my chest, in front of my heart. Everytime I had burned my hand had flashed across my mind as nothing more than a sunburn compared to this pain.

“You killed her!” He growled at me, his voice back to it’s usual raised volume.

“No I didn’t!” I screamed back, closing my eyes from the pain as the tears welled in them. Against my will, tears rolled down my cheeks, showing my weakness. I continued to growl as the pain in my chest only got worse as the heat spread. He pressed the rod harder against my chest, causing me to yell out as the smell and sound of sizzling flesh wafted towards me. I fought against the chains but I was trapped against the wall with the iron rod burning into my skin holding me in place.

“You killed her!” He screamed again. I didn’t argue with him. I couldn’t. I was in too much pain. It felt as though my skin was crawling off of my bones and no amount of screaming was helping. My heart started to beat faster and faster, and my vision started to blur. “You killed her,” he repeated. I couldn’t tell if he had screamed again, because all of my senses were failing me. The last thing I remembered before blacking out was the sound of the metal rod hitting the floor.

When I woke up, the smell of blood overwhelmed me, a metallic smell forever imprinted into my memory since I was seven. I didn’t have to look down at myself to see that it was my own, but I did anyway. My chest was bleeding, small gashes here and there. What really caught my eyes was a small pool of blood that had gathered around my feet, caking on parts of my feet as it dried.

How much blood did I have left? How many gashes and tears could my body take? How much more of this could I mentally take? How long until he was bored of me? 

I had a million questions and no answers.

The sound of a door slamming shut caused me to look up to see a blurry figure at the top of the stairs. I had no idea how long I had been down there. There was no light in the basement, even when he occasionally opened the door at the top of the stairs. And his visits were always random and varied in length so I couldn’t tell if there was any sort of pattern. My best guess was that I had been here for a few days at least because he had started to feed me food and water after a while. Though I knew he was only doing it to keep my alive longer for more torture, my body couldn’t resist trying to save itself and I finished whatever he gave me.

He never gave me a chance to escape or to catch my breath. He never even let me out of the chains to use the bathroom or to sleep which caused a new mixture of smells in the room that I didn’t even want to think about.

I tried to focus on the figure descending the stairs, the sounds of footsteps echoing through the cold basement as the blurry figure moved closer to me. He came to a stop a few feet in front of me, his face only barely surfacing past the cloud that blocked my vision.

“How are we feeling today?” He asked with sarcasm. I didn’t respond. Instead, I tried to drift back to the darkness.

But I could never catch a break.

I was awake.

And would remain awake. 

The whole time.

“I’ll be back soon,” he smiled at me as he set down a bloody scalpel. I could barely keep my eyes open, let alone let my gaze follow him as he started to leave. My breathing was just as heavy as it always was during our sessions, my throat hoarse from screaming and growling in pain. No matter how hard I had tried to stop growling or screaming, my body itself acted on instinct as though it would help to lessen the pain.

I buckled my knees, allowing my legs to relax while giving all of the pain to my shoulders. I forced my breaths to come out slow and evenly. If I breathed too hard or fast, my chest would start hurting. Either because of the burn that still hurt after all this time or because of the other various injuries he had caused me.

With each new stain of blood on the concrete at my feet, I felt myself slipping away. Bit by bit, inch by inch. The blood from days or weeks ago, I had no sense of time down here, had already reached the drain in the center of the room; leaving a dry, red trail. The gashes on my chest and arms were no longer healing fast and I wondered for the millionth time how long I would have until I was put out of my misery. Though he fed me every once in a while to keep me alive, I knew my body was probably working on its reserves by now. 

Sometime ago, he had brought in one of those IV racks and I knew he was going to start transfusions if he could find a way to get the matching blood. He wanted me just alive enough to torture me.

I knew I was going to die at a young age. It had never been a matter of if, but when for me. 

Just to prove my point, the door opened and the sound of footsteps grew louder before I could fall asleep. I tried to pay attention as he turned me around, my arms crossing over my chest and making me hiss from the contact against the cuts. 

“What do you think we should do today?” He called out as if there was a crowd waiting eagerly to see the show. I heard him pick out an instrument, the sound of him testing it on the wall beside me causing my muscles to tense. “This will do well,” he laughed before shuffling to the appropriate spot behind me. I had gotten used to the feeling of knives cutting my skin so much that I could almost tune out the feeling. It was hard, but there was this little part of my mind I would retreat to sometimes when I felt tired enough. I could hide there until it was over. But he had chosen something else this time and I was wide awake as soon as it struck against my back. 

I growled and pulled at the chains that held me as the pain in my back caused my chest to hit the brick wall in front of me. I had a vague idea of what he was using and it left a searing pain that ran from my shoulder down to the opposite side of my waist. He struck me again and again, each time enticing a loud growl and jerk from me.

He continued even as my legs gave out completely beneath me, again and again until he chuckled from satisfaction at his work. The only thing that stopped me from crying from pain was the fact that I had no water left in my body to spare. 

When he was satisfied with his work he turned me around, allowing some of the pain in my arms to subside. My eyes were closed for the next part, but I knew he took joy in the sign of fatigue. I felt a sharp knife lightly touch my forehead and with a few strokes, blood was slowly moving down my forehead and gathering at the tip of my nose before dropping off. I kept my eyes closed, praying that my release would be soon.

I was ready, hoping, praying for death.

The pain was tremendous but my swaying consciousness blocked out some of it. When he was finished with the session he muttered something to himself before retreating back up the steps. I took shaky breaths as the sound of his footsteps finally faded as the door shut behind him. I wasn’t able to listen to what he had said before he left, but I didn’t care. I tried to focus on getting as much sleep as possible while he was gone, though it was nearly impossible to do standing up. 

My shoulders burned from the strain of me kneeling but I didn’t have the energy to get back up even if I wanted to. My head dropped down, the blood from my forehead dropping off of my eyelashes and nose. I stayed there as I fell into something much like sleep but light enough that I would wake if I heard him come back.

I felt my sense come back to me as I heard his voice again, though it sounded muffled this time as though I was far away. Was this it? Was I finally getting the sweet release that I had been praying for? I could feel a small smile form on my lips with the last of my energy, my body falling completely forward and the pain starting to leave my body as his voice became more distant though I could tell he was screaming. 

I felt his breath fan over me but it didn’t help to warm my chilling body. I could feel the last breaths leaving my body and I pictured what I must have looked like hanging there, willing for a peaceful sleep of death.

And finally, with one last ragged breath, it came.